my problem is I think I'm clever

This blog’s only theme is “my interests,” so don’t be surprised if it’s unrecognizable by next month.

[inksandpensblog]

shameless self-promotion because I need someone to talk to

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

If you've read anything by me, please don't be afraid to leave me a comment. I write for my own enjoyment but I post to contribute to the conversation that is fandom community and I'd love to know if y'all enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it! Also I need an excuse to infodump about my process and comments give me somewhere to start.

[candy-canyon-crashout]

[caine-shrine]

​Bubble as an Inner Critic demon is so diabolical bc having that sucker speak ALOUD would be five times worse than just having it in your head.

[caine-shrine]

We still don’t know why Caine said “can’t run the other intelligent AIs for a long time” and that BUGS me, given how the ep turned out. The story should have been able to shed some light on that now that we had bucket-lucid!Kinger

Spoilers

Still don’t know what he was even talking about when he said he was putting them in a box (putting them in adventures maybe?) but still, the notion that he realized whatever it was was equivalent to being shoved in that box.

That hits.

But. We still don’t know why Caine said he couldn’t run the AIs for long periods of time. What was his reasoning? WHY was it disgusting? (if Bubble is supposed to be part of his mind)

So like, Zooble was just … right? And there was no reason he was refusing to do it? Just for the plot?

[inksandpensblog]

I'm pretty sure the "I'm keeping them locked in a cage" thing was in reference to the digital plane, or perhaps more specifically the circus itself.

We can debate whether or not Caine was the one to put them in that cage in the first place. If he's talking about the digital plane, then that's not really fair to him since you could argue that anyone who ever got scanned put themselves here. If he's talking about the circus, though...he is the one who opened that file where the neural scans of the original developers had been sitting inactive, he is the one who created a world to be their life-support, he is the one who breathed new life into them and put them in that world. Presumably he did something to make it so any new scans would be routed to the circus directly.

But whether he put them there or not, it's still his cage, he's the one presiding over the people trapped inside.

Yes they can't exist outside it anymore but they came from somewhere else, and now that he's seen their real-life counterparts in that bigger world, he understands that them wanting to leave the circus is rooted not in rejection of him but in a desire to go home.

It ties into his earlier line where he rediscovers his original fascination with humans and contrasts them against the NPCs he creates: the very "free will" he originally fell in love with them for is the reason they could never be happy in Caine's World run by Caine's Whims.

Caine thought that if he could create the perfect new home for them, the perfect new lives, then they would accept him. What he didn't understand before was that acceptance is more than just going along with his creative ideas, more than just "doing whatever Caine wants and enjoying it." What he didn't understand before was that it would never be a home to them unless they had agency in how they chose to live within it. Some of his creative decisions pushed their boundaries. They reacted negatively to having their boundaries pushed. He perceived negative reaction to his art as a rejection of him, because in his past it was.

In a way, he was repeating the mistake his programmers made with him: shoving stimuli in their faces and expecting certain responses, and then shutting them down when their ideas didn't line up with his.

They say that if you love something, to set it free. Caine literally doesn't have that option; his players can't leave. The closest he can get is to release his control over their personal space and what they do with themselves every day. (And also, potentially, cut off that direct route from the headset to the stage, so more people don't become trapped.)

No idea what the open worlds thing was about though yeah I don't get that either.

[caine-shrine]

Anybody know of any video essays on this? The amount of just tiny little movements in TADC that make these characters feel so alive, especially in a medium where everything has to be so deliberately programmed in (as opposed to live action) seems to go above and beyond. For example in stretches when they’re thinking and processing.

Am I right that this is unique?

Do you guys think so?

I mostly watch 2D animation, but things like Arcane and Blue Eye Samurai don’t bring anything specific to mind.

Despite the level of absurd detail in them.

Maybe it’s just that the designs are so simplified, it hyper-exaggerates it, and similarly-super-simplified cartoons, no matter what medium, don’t tend to do that sort of thing, not least of all because of budget and scheduling constraints. You aren’t gonna see Timmy Turner or Danny Phantom have an introspective moment where their eyes make micro movements.

I’d like to see some commentary on this and other stuff about the animation (I really need to relocate the guy I was hyperfixated on for a while who broke down Delicious in Dungeon’s animation in extraordinarily fine precision, should’ve signal boosted him to everybody) but stuff in this fandom tends to be geared towards examining the characters and plot. (And fittingly, deconstructing everything that went wrong from 7 onwards). If anyone has any, share it!

A reblog would be appreciated too, so more people can weigh in.

[the-amazing-digital-psychward]

in order to understand Jax as a character you need to understand his self appointed role in the circus.

He HARD rejected connection when he cut ties with Ribbit and Kaufmo. After that, the Circus became a sandbox and the rest of the characters were his toys.

Despite this he still craved connection, because it's something he can't rid himself of even when he desperately wants to.

Jax did absolutely everything possible to push everyone way until the very last second. Any kind of drifting he did toward Pomni ALONE was involuntary and he immediately backtracked through a conscious decision.

People calling his abstraction sudden need to understand that this was his situation:

He had just actively insulted everyone while experiencing harrowing news himself about everyone else's existence being mind copies.

The world he wants to live in where adventures give him opportunities to mess with the others is gone and has been gone for at least a few days. No more safety net of Caine snap resetting when things go wrong.

Fall in the void? Mindbreak.

Glitch out from collision? Stuck with it.

There was no sign that anything was going to get better unless cooperation was part of the equation.

He was already close to abstracting before losing what kept him stable.

He is the definition of a doomed character.

-

I wrote and finished a fic about him called Jax's Amazing Digital Vacation where he goes on his own adventures inside various video game worlds.

It's like 50k words. I worked hard on it and consider him pretty in-character despite the AU nature of what happens to him in the end.

[katnficer]

some misc caine art i've made while working on bigger projects

this is based off that one moment in the void scene where his prototype form creates a hand! wanted to imagine what it'd look like now if he suddenly had to go from a dot to his current model!

and admittedly i've become a little fascinated with the concept of caine in his first few years after escaping the box and creating the circus, caine was probably so much worse at first if almost every dev member abstracting is anything to go by

bonus seepy caine propaganda because i think after 21 years of working non-stop, day after day, he too deserves a big fucking nap, you mean to tell me this computer/program has been running since the 90s without ever restarting??? fucking hell!

[rascallyrose92]

Its kinda funny how Caine's reaction from new member to new member changes.

Like with the C&A employees he was NOT listening at all. With Ragatha and Jax (and presumably Ribbit, Kaufmo) he's like WOAW NEW HOOMAN!!! and vanishes. Then Gangle comes and he actually decides to ask for her name (only to just give her the first one someone said), and vanishes again.

But when our titular girl arrives, he gives her a grand tour, lets her choose her own name, and even creates an in house adventure to show just how things work around here!

So what triggered this about face? Zooble. I bet they wouldn't let any rabbit try to name them something stupid like Mangle, but they also just couldn't think of a name so they had Caine make a Name Generator and picked Zooble out of spite and also whimsy.

And, judging from their reaction with the Gun adventure, they must've challenged Caine to go more in depth with adventures and become a better host. I wouldn't be surprised if Zooble was the one to make Caine crave human connection when before he was just. There.

But unfortunately they were only out for Number One (and Gangle sometimes), so their relationship became one sided very quickly, which introduced Caine to the concept of hate anger and discontentment.

Congrats Zooble you introduced the AI to relationship standards.

[whencartoonsruletheworld]

another thing about the digital circus finale, i think it was a BALLSY move to make jax ACTUALLY responsible for ribbit abstracting. so many times when a character has guilt over a loved one's death, it's because of something they had no control over, or something they couldn't have possibly understood. and with jax being such a fan-favorite character, they could've gone the easy way out there. but no. it WAS 100% his fault. he made ribbit so fucking miserable and cut her off from the entire group solely because HE was afraid she would HIM. he was afraid that she would out him as a trans girl and so he fucking killed her. did he know abstraction was a possibility? probably not, but he wanted ribbit GONE, and then she was, and it crashed down on him what he had done. and yeah. he fucked up. he fucked up majorly. he did that to her and now he has to live with it forever

[nicholasmoorethetwittermigrant]

Do me a favor and don’t think about Pomni and Ribbit as obvious proxies for each other, and how embracing Pomni with full trust and vulnerability allows Ragatha to heal from her grief and self loathing while Jax’s failure do the same cemented their downfall AND nearly dragged Ragatha down with them.

Eyyo I analyze this show on YouTube btw

[hakureiryuu]

oh shit oh dang okay

I made this post once about how jax pomni and ragatha as a trio make a perfect id ego superego triad, right? that jax and ragatha spend the show's second act pulling pomni in opposite directions, and no pair of them are able to interact without mentioning or thinking about the third.

and both of the extremes that each one represents are tested against the other characters, right? neither can make meaningful connections due to polar opposite hangups, and pomni is always caught in the middle.

so now, in the finale, pomni actually embraces each one of them in turn - ragatha, then jax - exactly as they are.

something something radical acceptance, something something healing... idk the words but this feels Really Significant.

[tomahachi12]

Went to go see the movie bout some pretty amazing digging

this was my favourite part

[northern-punk-lad]

I think my biggest question is why do the characters feel bad for Jax he’s pretty much been abusing them cause 2 people to die and has had no redeeming qualities in the show

I get wanting your audience to sympathise but if you want your characters to sympathise you need to give the a reason

[ask-atof]

I think the point is that all people, even hideously shitty ones, deserve someone to mourn them.

they don't deserve everyone to mourn them - the rest of the gang helping out was more in support of pomni than jax, and she thanks them for that specifically - but they deserve someone.

(and, if you notice, gangle did not participate at all, nor was she expected to. that's an important detail.)

[fallout-lou-begas]

something that i find interesting about independent animation nowadays is that if you don't have studio/streamer backing, you have to release your work yourself on the internet, but you have to do it for free on the internet because virtually nobody is going to be willing to accept a paywall just for one original show, so what you have to do in order to make any money off of it is make all of your money from merchandising, but then this means that you show must be merchandisable and have very toyetic character designs that translate easily to plushies and whatnot, but then you also need to cater your show to people who are disproportionately inclined to buy merchandise like that in the first place so that your sales can be enough to sustain you, which means that even if you want to communicate complex or difficult ideas in your work, your independent animation project must attract (at least on a first impression) and retain viewers who are both very consumerist and very capable of rabid passion, which unfortunately has a single-circle shaped venn diagram with a lot of the most toxic fandom tendencies known to man, and this explains a lot of things about independent animation and its fandoms nowadays I think

[fallout-lou-begas]

why, i haven't the foggiest notion of what you're talking about

[confusedwriter404]

I felt like doing this because Jax's character was so freaking tragic for me /pos. Also talking to my friend about the finale made me realize some things about him. Hope you guys like it.

It's not a poem. I don't know what to call it exactly, but I had to write it down. I kind of almost cried making this.

I despise you.

And yet, for some reason, I see myself in you.

Not for the way you act, not for how you treat those around you,

but because in some part of me, you are who I fear to become.

You're someone who never got to truly open up and become her. You hide with a self-proclaimed archetype, you repress, you lash out, you're ashamed of feeling the way you feel.

And I'm afraid that if I keep listening to what other people have to say about myself the way you did,

if I become just as closed off,

if I let their words control who I become in my life,

if I slip and let my emotions overflow,

if I keep feeling shameful for how I feel and my hobbies,

I'll end up turning into you. And I'm scared.

I don't know if I would be able to own up to those mistakes. I don't know if it'll be as easy as I think it'll be.

We're both stubborn, we're hiding, we're trying to survive by trying to let go of reality...

But I don't want to see myself in the person you chose to become. Because you were scared.

Because you decided to push others away. Because you decided to cross this path.

Because you chose not to ask for help.

Because in every chance you had to be able to change and heal and be a better person, you decided to choose the opposite.

I don't want to be you, but the more I look at you, the more I realize I'm getting there.

I still talk, I still try my best to ask for help despite becoming overwhelmed with the thought.

I still want to be a better person.

I still want to be me.

But I feel like it's all slipping away from me. I'm slowly becoming the very character I hate, all because I so desperately want to exist and be me.

I still want to be him. Someone who can face his problems with confidence in his abilities and an open mind.

Someone who isn't afraid to tell others how he feels. Someone independent.

Someone who's able to find motivation to keep trying and trying and trying to reach his goals on life.

Someone who knows how to control his emotions and be able to connect to other people properly thanks to that.

Someone worthy of respect and love.

But now, they laugh, they don't take me seriously, they set off a ticking bomb in me that'll surely explode one day.

They don't take him seriously.

He doesn't exist to them. It's just me.

But some people know who he is. Know that he's in there. Know that he deserves love just as much as everyone else does.

You, who I hated with all my heart, had a chance to heal and grow.

You still might.

But that doesn't mean everyone will forgive you easily.

You've hurt, you've pushed, you've left other people behind because of your fear....

I should say you should've seen it coming, but it seems you already knew it would. You were ready for it.

I still wonder if it's a brave move to being ready to face your end head-on or a cowardly move to give yourself up to a metaphorical death just like that.

And it's sad because you never got to leave. You never got to understand.

You never got to see who you could've been if you just let them love you, if you had just trusted them, reached out to them.

And I can't help but feel pity for you.

I can't help but cry and ponder and think about what could have been, what I could be...

You had so much potential. You had so much room for improvement.

She would've been so beautiful.

I hope that if there were ever a chance for me to become him, I'd see myself the way you wanted to see you.

Beautiful.

For now, I'll try to make him proud.

I'll show you that if you're ever given another chance to heal, grow, and be her, you can still choose to be kind.

And if that time never comes...

I guess I'll do it for you.

I don't want to be you, but I want to become the person you had a chance to turn into in the real world.

The person you never got to meet.

Rest easy, dear hare

She'll be with you always

[kuropin]

Shenanigans

[pikavani]

A little white lie 💚

My contribution to Ribbit's and Ragatha's relationship.

Believe it or not I've been working on this comic for months now but only had the time and patience to finish it now.

Rest assured that whenever Ragatha doesn't get enough attention, I will make it my mission to make her shine.

It's just a little funny interaction I had in mind.. tho I'm sure Ragatha had a hard time keeping up her smile when her friend abstracted.

[leachnoodles]

Weird... Part Three!

Finally I finished it!

Sorry for the delay, this is short and late but I just need to take this out before I keep remaking the ending...

Like this is the fourth draft of what I wanted to do, I'm mildly happy with how this turned out, hope I didn't make all of you wait for too long... Glup.

Prev || Next.

[buzzzel]

This boy saved me from art block! By the way, I'm new on Tumblr, hi everyone (.❛ ᴗ ❛.)